A SWINDON councillor has backed calls for chewing gum giants to foot the bill for the footpath damage caused by people dropping their products.

Coun Derique Montaut has backed a proposal from the Local Government Association which represents almost 400 councils in England and Wales, which has called for manufacturers to pay part of the costs to remove discarded chewing gum from town centres.

The average piece of gum costs about 3p to buy but 50 times that – £1.50 – to remove.

It also does not biodegrade and once it has been been squashed on to the pavement needs specialised equipment to remove it.

Coun Montaut (Lab, Liden, Eldene and Park South), who has been campaigning for greater penalties on chewing gum littering, said: “I welcome the LGA’s call for gum manufacturers to contribute towards the cost of removing gum.

“Last year I met with Wrigley, who I think own more than 90 per cent of the market, to ask if they would contribute to the costs.

“They said that the focus should be on education in schools.

“I do think it is a problem that’s particularly prevalent in Swindon.

“It’s a behaviour and attitude problem. I think Britain is one of the biggest consumers of chewing gum in the world and people just spit it out whenever they are done with it.

“It’s not just on the pavement but then it gets stuck on your shoes and you walk it into your car and into your house.

“We have to change people’s attitudes about disposing of chewing gum.

“It doesn’t seem right that people can be fined hundreds of pounds for littering their cigarette butts but there are no penalties for spitting out chewing gum, even though it is very expensive to remove.”

Now the LGA is urging manufacturers to make their gum biodegradable and make it easier to remove.

LGA Environment spokesman, councillor Peter Box, said: “Chewing gum is a blight which costs councils a fortune to clean up and takes hours of hard work to remove.

“The UK gum industry is a multi-million pound business and we believe in the principle of the ‘polluter’ paying.

“The chewing gum giants should be making a substantial contribution to help with the sterling work that councils are doing in removing it.

“Councils have no legal obligation to clear up the gum. They do it for the benefit of town centre users and to make the pavements more attractiver.

“We acknowledge firms are contributing to litter prevention campaigns. However, given the size of the bill faced by councils this isn't cutting the mustard.”